> will sell data on anyone in their database, including current address, phone number and arrest records

I see. My current address, my phone number and something called my (public) arrest records are being sold to evil China at $10/pop. My phone number must be selling like hotcakes!

One thing Xi and Putin want to do, is to manipulate you to vote for their favorite future president (or future dictator) in the US. (Don't know if you're in the US though)

That would be a pretty considerable malinvestment considering the divisions of power and how lobbyist/special interests/ultrawealthy influences shape the American political discourse and outcomes. The whole process is a sham. It's all a very public sham, and has been, and I'm sure it's very salient to our geopolitical "opponents", and particularly those seated in the highest echelons.

However, what would make sense is sewing discord amongst the plebs and fraying the few little ties that bind which would drastically shift the US stranglehold because it would invariably lead to schismogenesis and a legitimately fractured nation with dramatic reallocation of power and character. This may be affected to some extent by bitter rivalries in the body politic, but that would be secondary to breaking the nation.

But really it just reads like the Red Scare banter all over again.

Do you not believe that the governments of Russia and China will pursue their interests at the expense of the United States? Of course they would, and it seems bananas to me that we should pretend otherwise.

no, no way. I will never let those miscreants manipulate my vote, it's not like I'm brainless! My vote is safe in the firm grasp of Fox and CNN.

Snowden: "Arguing that you don't care about the right to privacy because you have nothing to hide is no different than saying you don't care about free speech because you have nothing to say."

that's a very non-answer answer to the question of why would China pay $10+ or whatever for my address and my location in the US. To sway my vote? How does this make any sense?

I always assume that I'm not the smartest person in the room/world. There are 'unknown unknowns' everywhere, and people far smarter than me dedicate their lives to creating more of these unknowns for their own purposes, the purposes of their employers, their governments, etc.

I know this type of data can be misused in a variety of ways. Despite the fact that I can't exactly articulate how it might be misused in this instance, I choose 'default deny' because it reduces attack surface and the amount of unknowns that I have to contend with.

It seems you operate on a 'default allow' rule when it comes to this stuff, and you're welcome to choose that for yourself, but this is a minority position in today's world.

Them: I have nothing to hide.

Me: Ok, what is your salary?

Them: uhh... let's change the subject